Some people go to a networking mixer with only one goal in mind: surviving until the time they plan to leave. However, networking doesn’t have to be a dreaded activity! Here are two tips to help you make the most of your time at networking mixers, and to help you enjoy yourself so the time will practically fly by.

Set a Goal for the Number of People You’ll Meet. To get the most out of a networking event, set a goal regarding the number of contacts you want to make or the number of business cards you want to collect. Don’t leave until you’ve met your goal.If you feel inspired, set a goal to meet fifteen to twenty people and make sure you get each person’s business card. If you don’t feel so hot, shoot for less. In either case, set a reachable goal based on the attendance and the type of group.

Spend Ten Minutes or Less with Each Person You Meet and Don’t Linger with Friends and Associates. Since your first goal is to meet a given number of people, you can’t spend too much time with any one person, no matter how interesting the conversation gets. Stay focused on making as many contacts as you can. When you meet people who are very interesting and with whom you want to spend more time, set up appointments with them. You can always meet later to continue the conversation.Don’t try to close business deals while you’re networking; it’s impractical. Set a date to meet and discuss your product or service in an environment more conducive to doing business. You may be able to increase your business with hot prospects if you take the time to fully understand their needs.Learn to leave conversations gracefully. Honesty is usually the best policy; tell them you need to connect with a few more people, sample the hors d’oeuvres, or get another drink. If you feel uncomfortable with that, exit like a host by introducing new acquaintances to someone you know. Better yet, if it seems appropriate, ask them to introduce you to people they know.Above all, don’t linger with friends and associates. These are people you already know, and you’re there to meet people you don’t know. I attended a mixer once where I saw several business friends stand and talk with one another for two hours. On their way out, one actually complained, “This was a waste of time. I didn’t get any business from it, did you?” Ummm, seriously??

I highly recommend you try executing these two tips at your next networking mixer. After you do so, come back and leave a comment in the forum below to let me know how it worked out. I’m confident you’ll be pleased with the results and I’d love to hear about your experience!

At a recent Referral Institute® Conference, I had the opportunity to talk with my good friend (and partner in the Referral Institute), Mike Macedonio, about a fantastic new (and completely FREE) service which is available to businesspeople and networkers across the globe. It’s called ‘More Money Mondays’ and by signing up for the service you get weekly referral marketing tips delivered to you via e-mail each Monday which will help you learn how to simultaneously build your business and make your work week shorter and more enjoyable.

Watch the video now to get all the details on this exciting new service and CLICK HERE or go to www.MoreMoneyMondays.com to sign up for your FREE weekly referral marketing tips. If you’re already utilizing ‘More Money Mondays,’ I’d love to hear what you think of the service it provides–please leave your thoughts and feedback in the comment forum below. Thanks!

Professionals in business are truly professionals because they’re great at their chosen career, but they often don’t look forward to getting out of the workplace and networking. In this brief video, I talk to Sarah Owen, referral marketing expert and Master Franchisee for the Referral Institute in the UK, and she offers some real-life, highly effective, and simple-to-implement tips on making the move from the office into networking events.

Do you have any tips or suggestions to add to what Sarah talks about in this video? If so, please share them with us in the comment forum below–thanks!

In this brief video, Australian networking master Paul Lomas shares some ideas with me about making people feel welcome when they arrive at networking meetings and events. He also gives a very useful tip on how to give a great response when someone asks how you are doing in order to create an opportunity for positive, genuine connections.

The video emphasizes the importance of the visitor’s experience to a networking group and how it can very significantly shape their choice regarding whether or not to return to that group. Sometimes it can be much too easy to get comfortable in networking groups and neglect visitors. For that reason, I urge you to watch this short video because it’s a great reminder of just how important it is to genuinely make visitors welcome in order to grow your network and make your networking group as successful as it can possibly be.

Do you have any good tips or stories about how you or others in your networking group make others feel welcome? Please share them in the comments forum so others can learn from your tactics for successfully meeting, greeting, and making visitors feel at home.

In this short video, presented by Applied Transformation, Inc., I talk with Roger Green about how to achieve balance in life.

If you often find yourself focusing on business during family outings or thinking about your kid’s soccer game while you’re in an important meeting, I highly encourage you to watch this video. You’ll get tips on how to prioritize, be present, and achieve ultimate harmony.

Do you have any helpful tips on promoting harmony in business and life? If so, please share them in the comment forum below. Please don’t be shy–let’s get the comments rolling in!

This week I am in Bangkok and Hong Kong speaking to business professionals about networking. When you travel (especially internationally) it is easy to forget something you really need while you are in meetings or speaking to groups of people. Last month, I did an interview with an international magazine on this very topic. The reporter asked me “what should business people think about taking with them on business trips that they might not normally think about?”

First, I had to give the things that may be obvious but that you don’t want to ever forget. Things like:

Plenty of business cards. It is never a good idea to run out of business cards while traveling. Tuck extras in your suit pockets, wallet/purse, briefcase, luggage, etc. I put stacks in many places to ensure I always have extra.

A badge. If you do any networking while traveling on business, have your own professional badge. Don’t rely on the hosting organization to do your badge and do it right.

Extra pens. Make sure you have a pen with you while you are doing meetings. I always find that I need to write some reminders down while I’m talking to people. It’s troublesome to track down a pen while you are networking.

Somewhat less obvious things

The contact information (or business cards) of all your referral partners. I sometimes find that having that information at my fingertips allows me to give referrals to people while I’m out networking.

Hand sanitizer. I know, I’m sounding a little bit like “Mr. Monk” the germ-a-phobe title character of a television series. However, I have found that since I’ve started using hand sanitizer after shaking many, many hands, that I have been getting far less colds than I used to get. Just be tactful about the way you use it. Don’t desperately spray your hands every time you shake someone’s hands or else you will be acting like Monk.

Breath mints. As obvious as it may sound – I can assure you from experience that many people have no idea they need them!

A memory stick. Many times I have either needed to get a copy of something OR give a copy of a file or presentation to people while out networking. Having a memory stick handy has been very helpful on several occasions.

A camera and/or video. A camera is great if you want to memorialize some occasion or a meeting with someone important to you. A video is important for anyone that blogs. It gives you a chance to interview someone during your travels. I do this almost every time I travel.

Tools for your business. For me, that includes many copies of my bio for introductions whenever I speak. Despite the fact that my team sends the bio in advance, there are many times when I arrive and they don’t have the bio handy. Another tool for me is a PowerPoint remote clicker. This is really important for me because I don’t want to rely on someone else to move the slides forward as a I present. Also, that memory stick I mentioned earlier. I have copies of my talk(s) on there just in case the group I’m speaking to has misplaced my presentation material.

There’s more, but this is a pretty good list. What do you think is important to bring along with you on business trips? Share it with us here in the comments section.

In this short video, I talk to Australian networking expert Dan Kuss about how to creatively and effectively introduce networking to someone who is convinced that they won’t benefit from it.

We offer solid tips on how to engage people who think their field isn’t conducive to business networking (many types of tradespeople, for example) so that they change their mind and become interested in networking and becoming your referral partner.

If you are struggling with how to introduce networking to someone who you know would be a great referral partner if they would only become open to networking and give it a try, test out the tips in this video and then please come back and leave a comment about your experience and about how successful your results were.

I had the opportunity to hear Chip Conley speak at the Transformational Leadership Council this last weekend. He spoke about his new book Emotional Equations.

Chip created this self-help paradigm in order to break down life’s toughest obstacles into manageable facets that you can see clearly – and influence. When Chip suffered a series of tragedies in the space of just a couple years – and his heart inexplicably flatlined after a speech – he began using what he came to call “Emotional Equations” (like Joy = Love – Fear) to help him understand and articulate what was going on in his internal system. These simple formulas helped him focus on the variables in life that he could deal with, rather than ruminating on the unchangeable constants (the bad economy, death, taxes) he could not.

Emotional Equations give people a new perspective on life and lead them beyond the concept of emotional intelligence and into an emotional fluency that enables someone to identify, name, and manage elements that can define, hurt, and help them. Equations like “Despair = Suffering – Meaning” and “Happiness = Wanting What You Have ÷ Having What You Want,” have been reviewed for mathematical and psychological accuracy by experts. With compelling real-life stories, Conley inspires people who study his material through these equations and to formulate others to address their own circumstances.

Chip says: “In these turbulent times, when so many are trying to become ‘superhuman’ in order to deal with life’s speed bumps, tragedies, and setbacks, Emotional Equations guides you toward becoming a ‘super human’ being.”

So, how do you keep business on the up and up amidst a constant onslaught of challenges that require you and your business to change and adapt?

Watch this short video for some powerful tips from my good friend and author of The Solutions Focus, Dr. Mark McKergow.

You’ll learn, like I have, that one of the most important things a business owner can do to strengthen and grow their business is to operate on a daily basis by focusing on solutions. Mark always says that if a company focuses primarily on problem, they become an expert at problems–instead, they need to focus on solutions!

After you’ve watched the video, come back and leave a comment to let me know which of Mark’s tips was the most valuable for you.

No, not the end of the world, silly . . . I’m talking about the end of the recession. Recently, I wrote about “Business Looking up in 2011” which was based on a survey of over 5,000 businesspeople and entrepreneurs at www.BNIBusinessIndex.com. The survey was a global survey that was taken by people from every populated continent in the world.

The survey found that almost 68% of the respondents say that business is growing or growing dramatically compared to this time a year ago. What the survey doesn’t explain is why those businesses are growing.

I have a few thoughts, based on my observations recently, which may shed some light on this and also provide insight into how you can grow your business:

Innovation in adversity is a key factor. I know a commercial real estate broker in Southern California who said that he had his best year ever in 2010 (and he’s been in business for 26 years). He cited the fact that he did dozens and dozens of one-to-ones during the year to find ways to work together with other businesses. His opening approach was to help them. However, at the same time, it built his business in the process. This is counter-intuitive to most commercial real estate people he told me.

It all starts with attitude. A product sales company in the UK was about to do layoffs to meet payroll. One of the sales reps wrote on the whiteboard – “we refuse to participate in the recession.” Everyone in the office signed it. They ended up with their best month all year and no one was laid off!

Look for new or emerging opportunities. I met a residential Real Estate agent on the East Coast of the U.S. who told me he had his best year ever last year. He said he went to investors he’s worked with in the past and told them that “real estate is on sale!” He said to them, “don’t be one of those people who come to me in a few years and say… “I was crazy not to look at these opportunities. I should have bought back in 2010!” He told me this strategy has helped him sell more than any year in recent memory.

Be creative with your offers. I recently met a business coach in the mid-west of the U.S. who created a guarantee for his coaching. He said, if you follow my weekly coaching program and you don’t raise your income to at least six figures, I’ll continue to coach you for free until you do. He said it has dramatically increased his sales and has not had to provide any clients with free coaching yet.

If you have any insights / observations about the current upward slope of business or outside-the-box tips on how to boost business despite a challenging economy, please leave a comment and share your thoughts.

The list, published by OEDb (Online Education Database), was created as a resource for young entrepreneurs who are looking to learn some basic business principles and discover how to communicate and collaborate in the real world before finding success. Divided into categories (“Tools & Resources,” “Inspiration & Testimonials,” “Tips & Education,” “Industry News,” and Insights “From Young Entrepreneurs”), the list presents the top blogs that will help you communicate, collaborate, master the science of SEO and social media marketing, shake hands like a professional, and more.

Young entrepreneur or not, this list contains a cornucopia of excellent links that will provide you with an endless amount of useful information.

I’m honored to be included in this list of the “50 Best Blogs for Young Entrepreneurs” and I encourage all of my blog readers to check out the list and explore the great (and FREE) information that’s out there to help contribute to your success!